29. August 11

If you look up at Graham’s Quinta dos Malvedos from the river, at the top of the hill to the right you will see a small cluster of buildings which were once the heart of a small quinta called Valdossa. For years they sold their grapes to Graham’s and ultimately sold the property to us, and it became part of Malvedos.

26. August 11

It was an Accademia di Vino moment. Since it opened in 2007, this downstairs restaurant in Manhattan has climbed steadily up — in praise and acclaim for its regional Italian food, its innovative dishes, its service and its selection of more than 800 wines, nearly 40 of them offered by the glass. From the beginning, owner Anthony Mazzola has worked to create the atmosphere he found in restaurants in Italy: the visible pleasure and celebration of food and wine. In doing so, he has brought an authentic touch of Italy to New York.

So, Gary Vaynerchuk has left the world of wine. After 100 episodes of winelibrary.tv (which he retired from earlier this year), and then 89 episodes of the daily grape, the wine world loses one of its most colourful, entrepreneurial and charismatic figures.

There are some developments in the last stage of the grape ripeness, few days before harvest starts. Last Sunday night it rained heavily in the Douro valley. This rain was very welcome as it did not damaged the berries and irrigated the dry soils of the vineyards. With this extra humidity in the soil, grapes will last a little bit longer in the vines before we start collecting them, what shall happen right in the beginning of September.

25. August 11

Graham’s blogger is at Quinta do Tua this evening, and in the course of a sunset walk through the vineyards came across Charles Symington and Pedro Leal da Costa. The most important part of our maturation studies is this: tasting the berries.

I celebrated a significant birthday this year and with the help of some enthusiastic members of the Port Forum (click on ‘links’ for more information) we uncorked some splendid wines including the oldest Vintage Port that I have ever tasted:

The 2007 Port Vintage is not comparable to any other that I have tasted in my career (I go back to the 1983 vintage, not that far but still far enough). The wines have a wonderful purity. The vibrant fruit that is so expressive of the Douro shines through clearly on the nose and palate. The 2007s have a freshness and vivacity that I have not seen at this stage before. 'Elegance' and 'poise' are words that crop up frequently in my tasting notes, particularly among the best wines which are supported by fine, tight-knit tannins. This is not a blockbuster, blackstrap vintage and there are no few stewed, cooked raisiny or pruney flavours (cp. the hot vintage of 2003). Some wines have a green edge, a sort of hedgerow character on the nose and there are some wines that are clearly under-ripe.

24. August 11

Monday afternoon when I was wondering where Charles was for our harvest report meeting, I peeked into the tasting room. Together with Nuno Moreira and Manuel Rocha (back to camera) he was reviewing a line up of white ports.

There were about 27 interviews included in Life on the Douro, if you include a couple of tour guides. Some other people played an important role, even though they didn’t speak or their interview wasn’t included for one reason or another. Here are the interviewees, and a couple of other people as well.

20. August 11

Done! I came back home three weeks ago with plenty of new material, great interviews with Fladgate Partnership chairman Alistair Robertson, Paul Symington and Dirk Niepoort, and edited non-stop to get the finished film out to the Douro Film Harvest. The film’s narrative structure was already in place, but with some gaps, and I needed Alistair Roberston to give me a quick run-down on The Fladgate Partnership history, and Dirk Niepoort to give me an overview of the Douro Boys, an association of five producers, and their marketing effort. Instead, Alistair gave me about an hour and a half of material and Dirk’s interview was an hour long. Dirk was also the last of some 27 participants lending their viewpoints to Life on the Douro, fittingly, as he ends the film.

18. August 11

Since many years ago, Vila Nova de Gaia, the second biggest Portuguese city in population to Lisbon, has had a very important rule in the Port Wine business. It was from the dock of Vila Nova de Gaia, right before the mouth of the Douro river that Port Wine used to be shipped, mainly in pipas but also in bottles, to all over the world. The entreposto of Gaia, which stands in front of the city of Porto (on the left/ south margin of the Douro river), was the only one where Port Wine could be exported from (until 1986 when Portugal joined the EU). This means that though Port Wine was produced in the Douro valley, over 100km away from Gaia, it had to be taken all the way down of the Douro river, to Gaia from where it then could be exported. This way, it is without surprise that many foreign merchants set up a warehouse or lodge in Gaia where they could store and age the Port Wine, which they would buy in the Douro for further shipment.